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How To Play Lady Bug


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I was at an arcade tournament a few years ago and was surprised at how many people are unaware of how to play this game.

 

Here I play the game on the Atari 2600, but you can employ the same strategies on the ColecoVision and the arcade game. The only difference between the home game and the arcade game is the handling of the word SPECIAL: the home game gives you a vegetable harvest maze for big points whereas the arcade game awards you a free game.

 

In the arcade game, you'll want to prioritize spelling EXTRA so you can build up additional lives. In the home game, you'll want to prioritize spelling SPECIAL to get the big points through the vegetable harvest.

 

http://youtu.be/QxbywrMWvTk

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I've played this most in MAME. My #1 strategy is to take the few seconds before the round starts to find one letter in EXTRA that I am currently missing and plot a path straight to it. By the time you get there, it will be YELLOW and you can add it to your word count. I prioritize X, T, and R because they do not also appear in SPECIAL and seem to come up less often. After I get that first letter, I go get the multipliers. If none of the letters on the screen are ones I need for EXTRA then I go get the multipliers immediately (ensuring they are blue) and try to eat all the other letters as RED. By that time, there are usually a few bugs on the screen and I can make a run for the middle vegetable.

 

If you eat the middle veg and one of the bugs is returned (hitting a skull etc) then a new veg will be revealed when the bug exits again. This can add up to big points if you eat multiple veggies, but it is tricky to hide behind the skulls and coax the bugs into hitting them.

 

If you end up eating the middle veg and have a bug bearing right down on you, just chill out for a few seconds. The bugs usually do not enter the middle square even if you are right in front of them. Sometimes they do, but wait it out and they might pass you by.

 

 

https://archive.org/stream/arcade_ladybug/ladybug.zip?module=ladybug&scale=2&keyboard=arcade

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This is one of my favorite maze games next to the Pac-Man games and I actually prefer the home (CV) version because of the veggie maze.

 

My tips on the CV version (I usually play on difficulty #4):

- The controller on the CV needs a lot of getting used to if you didn't grow up with it, try another controller if it doesn't suit you, side buttons are not used.

- Eat the center dots around the bug generator first if you can, even on faster levels.

- Always spell the word SPECIAL first on the CV and try not to die. If you die, it will throw off the sequence of letters (more duplicate letters will show) and you have a lesser chance of spelling it out. At this point start spelling EXTRA out until you get the letters you need for SPECIAL. I've confirmed this on real hardware over years of playing.

- Try and eat blue hearts early on for maximum bonus points (x3 if I remember).

- You can lure bugs to their doom by carefully positioning the turnstiles. If you "kill" enough of them it will be safer to eat the center veggie that pops up when they are all out. Even easier if you hide in a safe zone....

- I use the following safe zone for waiting to pounce on a veggie and finish off a level. Once the coast is clear I come out, eat the veggie and finish eating the dots to complete the level. My safe zone is the upper right corner (provided I flip the turnstile bottom-left of the blue heart. They can sometimes still get you there):

safe%20zone.JPG

 

 

Anyway I'm sure people have better strategies but this is mine, be nice if we had a classic game strategies pinned here at Atari Age. Would be nice to read through them all.

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A few LadyBug notes...

 

It seems the VCS version suffers from the mirroring common to most static screen VCS titles, a slight annoyance, but not anything deal breaking...

 

for the console versions, (VCS/Coleco/INTV) yes, the Special vegetable garden is nice, the higher the level the more the vegetable once the enemies are out is worth, so lives are also quite a premium commodity... Do not pass em by...

 

Also, once getting the vegetable, the enemies will be paused in place for a limited period of time, this can be good OR bad, as even though they are paused in place, they will still kill the ladybug if they touch.

 

Also, you can score the vegetable more than once per level. Get the vegetable, and then get an enemy to die via the skull... Once the enemy returns to the game, the vegetable will be respawned. :)

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